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Teachers tell board immersive 'Footsteps to Freedom' trip reshaped classroom teaching
Summary
A team of Apple Valley Unified educators described an eight-day Footsteps to Freedom trip retracing Underground Railroad sites, saying the experience deepened historical empathy and will change classroom lessons and materials.
A team of Apple Valley Unified teachers told the district board on Sept. 1 that an eight-day Footsteps to Freedom trip through Underground Railroad sites and related museums profoundly changed how they will teach Black history and civic lessons.
"History isn't inevitable," Marius Killian, who introduced several classroom images from the trip, said during the presentation. He described reenactments, visits to the John P. Parker House and a museum exhibit of the Middle Passage that made the historical trauma palpable to participants.
Presenters described walking reenacted slave-auction simulations, climbing steep, uneven steps used by escapees and touching artifacts such as large iron collars to convey the physical weight of enslavement. "It was a literal threshold into something different," one teacher said of entering a restored farm in Canada where freedom seekers settled, and many presenters said they needed tissues while recounting the experience.
Organizers said the district sent roughly 10 teachers on a voluntary, immersive professional-development trip that followed routes from Kentucky through Ohio, Detroit and into Canada. Hardy Brown, one of the tour organizers, told the board the program aims to build historical empathy and has taken more than 5,000 educators on similar trips over 30 years.
Several speakers framed the trip as a learning opportunity that cannot be replicated in a textbook. "As a teacher these stories of sacrifice and resilience must be told to enrich students' learning in a deeper and meaningful way," a presenter said.
Board members thanked the presenters and said they support continuing the district's investment in immersive professional development. Maria Opara, board president, stood with the presenters to recognize their work and applauded the connection between the trip and classroom practice.
The presentation concluded with an invitation for board members and community members to speak with the teachers about their experiences and how the lessons may be shared with students. The board did not take a formal action on curriculum changes at the meeting; presenters said that follow-up work would include aligning classroom materials with the district's curriculum team and county guidance.
